CleanSpark announced Thursday that it will soon expand its crypto mining capacity by 200 megawatts in West Texas, with a goal of adding 300 megawatts on top of that in the future.
The company closed a deal with energy technology company Lancium, which has been building out so-called “clean campuses” across the state of Texas, largely drawing power from renewable energy, according to the announcement.
About 50 megawatts of CleanSpark’s new mining capacity will come online by December 2022 and the remaining 150 megawatts should be operational in the spring of 2023. That will take CleanSpark’s hashrate from the current 4 EH/s to an estimated 20 EH/s.
As more and more crypto miners move to the US after the China ban, many of them have turned to Texas, with its relatively cheap power and deregulated grid. West Texas, in particular, has attracted miners drawn to the abundance of wind and solar capacity.
CleanSpark said its strategy is to both expand its own mining facilities and to partner with colocation service providers such as Lancium.
“This hybrid approach helps us ensure that we always have rackspace ready to deploy new machines when they are delivered to us by the manufacturers,” said Zach Bradford, CEO of CleanSpark. “Such speed and optionality is critical as we scale our mining operations from megawatts to gigawatts in the coming years.”
The company said the deal with Lancium stipulated that a least 70% of the energy delivered should be carbon-free, “with a commitment to work toward 100% renewable energy.”
CleanSpark is expected to be located in Abilene, the company said. Lancium owns another operating site in Houston and is building out one in Fort Stockton.
In November of last year, the company said that it had raised $150 million and had its sights set on reaching 2 gigawatts of capacity in development across its sites in the next year.
